Why You Should Be Paying Attention to Local Politics

The President of the United States is a very powerful position at least that is what we believe.

We all watch him closely and everyone has a comment or opinion on the things he does. But does he really do a whole lot that affects you personally?

What happens at the federal level does have an impact, but in your day to day life a local official will have more power over you than the enormous federal government. On the flip side you will have more power over a local official too.

Your vote matters more locally than it does nationally. But the changes you make locally can grow and impact things nationally.

Affects You More

While it is fun to talk about Congress, the White House, and the Supreme Court, it is also important to talk about your local elected officials.

They are the ones making laws that effect you directly. They can raise or lower your taxes, decide on the amount of money to spend in schools, and what programs should be funded.

It is these everyday decisions that make up most of the laws and determine how your tax dollars are spent.

More Influence and Control

While local politics is not as glamourous as national politics, it is every bit as important.

While the local politician has more direct influence over you, you also have more direct influence of them as well. A group of 1000 people on the national level is not that big, but a group of 1000 people in one town can mean the difference between winning an office and losing one.

Winning a local office means you will have the ability to make direct and local changes. It is these small changes that are the foundation of grass roots movements.

With these local grass roots movements you can begin to make change in a big way.

Small Change Makes Big Change

People like success. If you are able to make a change locally and it works well, people will want to copy it.

If charter schools work to increase graduation rates, people will demand charter schools. Regardless of the party, parents want what is best for their kids. If you prove locally that something works great, people will see that success and spread it. This is how ideas and movements are made.

It is also in these small actions that biases are broken. It is a lot harder to think of a Republican as a Nazi if he is the one who is organizing donations to help the local homeless at your school. It is in these local offices where you can build one on one relationships that break the narrative.

Local offices play important roles in the community and can influence how people see politicians. They are also the ones who can make real on the ground change. Desegregation and Civil Rights started locally way before they took place nationally.

Clean Your Room

A popular meme on the internet comes from Professor Jordan Peterson where he tells people to clean their room.

He explains “If you can’t even clean up your room, who the hell are you to give advice to the world?”

This means start small, clean your room, then when that is taken care of move on to the next thing. Clean your house. Imagine if everyone just focused on making their own lives better and the lives of those around them better.

Imagine if we had Oregon running so well that when things go bad nationally we are strong enough to not only take care of ourselves, but be able to help others.

A focus on the local level will have an impact on the national level. We also have more power to impact the local level than the national level. And while it might be exciting and engaging to talk about what the President is doing now, ultimately he will have less direct impact on you than your local elected officials.

So why don’t we clean our room, who knows things might just get better.